How Her Magic Works: Anastasia’s family can turn into swans. They have magic linked to their singing and dancing—which affects the weather and can help heal people. They also have magic arrows that they wrap with pieces of long, blonde hair, which make people forget about them or fall in love with them.

When they fall in love for the first time they get their feather cloaks which can turn them into swans, but they need to collect the swan feathers to make these cloaks. If they don’t fall in love in their lifetimes, they might go a little crazy.

The Renard family steal the Vila’s hair to steal their magic.

Pierce Kent Interviews Anastasia Vila

Pierce: Vila, Vila, Vila, what would I do without you? … Seriously, I mean, what do you think my life would be like if we weren’t friends?

Ana: Simpler. But oh so boring.

Pierce: Unlike me, you’ve been born into a magical family, which might be the coolest thing ever. Are you glad, or sometimes, do you wish that you were just a normal teen with only normal teen problems, like finding enough time to finish your homework and graduate from high school?

Ana: You know I do. At some point, I’d like to do a full hour’s homework without foxes and swans getting into a fight or stealing our cloaks or whatever. It’s the worst excuse: sorry, the dog ate my homework. Or fox, close enough.

Pierce: I know she can transform into a fox, a swan girls’ natural enemy, but is there any other reason that you hate Liv so much? (I mean, it seems like you hate her more than any of the other Renards.)

Ana: She just bugs me. She’s goes out of her way to bug me. She keeps thinking I’m going to hurt you and that bugs me too. Seriously, she’s a pain. The real question, is how the hell do you get along with her so well?

Pierce: Since you asked me, we live in Stratford, ON, and you’ve been working on a Romeo & Juliet essay for a while, what is your favorite Shakespearean play and why?

Ana: Something happy like A Midsummer’s Night Dream. Or dark like Macbeth. Remember that time they staged Macbeth, and Mei Lin went around saying Macbeth instead of “The Scottish Play” just so she could freak out the actors? One of them kept jumping up to turn around 3 times whenever she did it. She was banned from the café.

Pierce: I think that I know everything about you – we are best friends – but do you have any secrets from me and everyone else?

Ana: Kent, you have no idea. Sometimes magic is gross. You really don’t need to know.

Pierce: My room – and life – is overflowing with books, so I’ve got to ask, what is your favorite book? (Your answer is very important.)

Ana: Can I cheat and say A Game of Thrones because you love it? You’d know I was lying though because A Game of Thrones has way too much feuding for my taste. I want to escape all that when I read. So…Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell.

Pierce: You are magical. That’s a fact. You didn’t get to choose the type of magic you have, so if you could choose – what would you choose?

Ana: I like the healing parts. I’d keep that for sure. And the weather control is pretty handy. I don’t mind our magic, it’s how you use it. That I mind sometimes.

Pierce: The Vila clan is packed full of swan girl aunts and cousins, which complicates your life. Who is your favorite family member?

Ana: Mei Lin, and Sonnet and I are the closest. Well, as close as you can get to Sonnet. She’s kinda prickly.

Pierce: You know a lot of…ahem…questionable songs. Do you like them for what they are or do you think that you like them because you don’t know any other more popular ones?

Ana: I don’t live under a rock, Kent. I know other songs, but none of them have the same historical weight. Our family has sung those folk ballads for hundreds of years. That kind of repetition adds to the magic.

Pierce: From the books I’ve read, it seems like magic comes so much easier for other magical beings, but in our world, making magical cupcakes may not have the desired effect, but sometimes, it can have a prolonged effect. How can you tell the difference between whether the magic has worked at all or too well?

Ana: Unfortunately, that parts usually easy. When magic goes wrong if often triggers an avalanche of side effects. Usually bad ones.

Pierce: With a song, you and the rest of the Vila girls can make someone fall in love with you, which doesn’t seem to bother your cousins, but concerns you. Why would you feel guilty for doing what you’re meant to do?

Ana: Because it’s cheating. And our magic can’t make someone actually love you, just be infatuated. That’s not the same thing. Love, I want. Infatuation is dangerous. And frankly, irritating.

Pierce: Remember when we were 12, and we kissed, but there weren’t any feathers in sight? I’m sure any answer you give would be pure conjecture, but do you think you have to see the feathers first to know that there’s true love between a swan girl and anyone else or do you have to feel and acknowledge the love for the feathers to appear?

Ana: I wish I knew, Kent. Love is almost as complicated as magic.

Love Ana and Pierce’s banter? Check out this magical excerpt from Ana’s POV:

I couldn’t help obsessing, just a little, on how I was never going to get my feather cloak. I’d end up eating fish heads in the woods with Morag. There was an itch between my shoulder blades, a physical ache for wings. And the guy I liked currently nuzzling some girl’s neck.

Now that Edward was off kissing some other girl, there was nothing to distract me from the drunken hooting of three guys trying to shotgun beer from the keg to impress girls who looked more concerned with having that same beer spat all over them. A girl was doing cartwheels for some inexplicable reason. She must be from town because doing cartwheels in a field at night was just asking to land in cow shit. Most of the others were lying on the roofs of their cars, watching the stars. The moon was fat and yellow, reflected in a small pond. I followed it, out of ingrained habit.

Pierce found a white feather stuck in the roots of a tree. He passed it to me for my collection. His knuckle oozed blood. He followed my glance.

“Thorn tree,” he said, nodding to the edge of the pond. There were red splotches on his sleeve.

“Let me fix it.”

“It’s no big deal.”

“It’ll get infected and your knuckles will fall off and you’ll die,” I pointed out, borrowing a threat from Aunt Felicity. According to her we were always in danger of having various body parts just fall right off. “Hold still and let me do this.”

I was always prepared for small healing. Usually my backpack was full of pouches of herbs. If it was ever searched it would look really bad. Currently, my cargo pants pockets were stocked with mint, marigold petals, salt, and plantain leaves.

Pierce looked slightly nervous. “You know, I think I have antibacterial cream in the truck.”

“Don’t be a baby. You love magic.”

“Yeah, when it’s aimed at my idiot little brother, and not me.”

“Better hope I’m better at this than the cupcakes of doom, then.” I cradled his hand, his skin warm against mine. I sang softly because you never knew who might be listening. And family tradition didn’t exactly run to Top 40. “John Barleycorn was a hero bold, Of noble enterprise; For if you do but taste his blood, ’Twill make your courage rise.”

“Cannibalism?” Pierce asked dubiously. “How exactly is that healing?”

“I can sing the one about the guy who’s hanged by his own entrails.”

“I’m good, thanks.”

A tiny electrical shock sparked between us. I jumped, fingertips tingling. There was a small gasp, like a sob. “There’s no need to cry.” I rolled my eyes. “It can’t hurt that much.”

His eyebrows rose. “That wasn’t me, Ana.”

It had sounded like weeping, but it might have been the wind.

Footsteps, a small shriek.

Or not.

About Love Me, Love Me Not:

Disclaimer: This Entangled Teen Crave book contains language, violence, and lots of kissing. Warning: it might induce strong feelings of undeniable attraction for your best friend.

Dating isn’t easy when you’re in the middle of a blood feud.

Anastasia Vila’s family can turn into swans, but just once she’d like them to turn into responsible adults.

After hundreds of years, they still cling to the blood feud with the Renard family. No one remembers how it started in the first place—but foxes and swans just don’t get along.

Vilas can only transform into their swan shape after they have fallen in love for the first time, but between balancing schoolwork, family obligations, and the escalating blood feud, Ana’s got no time for love. The only thing keeping her sane is her best friend, Pierce Kent.

But when Pierce kisses Ana, everything changes.

Is what Pierce feels for her real, or a byproduct of her magic? Can she risk everything for her best friend? And when the family feud spirals out of control, Ana must stop the fight before it takes away everything she loves.